Once more unto the Shakespeare

I have been watching Henry V. It is one I have seen before and it is good. This time I noticed more things about it that show that Shakespeare was writing for cats as well as mannys.

"But there's a saying very old and true,

'If that you will France win,

Then with Scotland first begin.'

For once the eagle England being in prey,

To her unguarded nest the weasel Scot

Comes sneaking and so sucks her princely eggs,

Playing the mouse in absence of the cat,

To tear and havoc more than she can eat."

This is a bit confusing - I am a Scottish cat, so does that make me a weasel, a mouse, or am I still a cat?

"Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;

Or close the wall up with our English dead.

In peace there's nothing so becomes a man

As modest stillness and humility:

But when the blast of war blows in our ears,

Then imitate the action of the tiger;

Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,

Disguise fair nature with hard-favour'd rage;

Then lend the eye a terrible aspect;

Let pry through the portage of the head

Like the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it

As fearfully as doth a galled rock

O'erhang and jutty his confounded base,

Swill'd with the wild and wasteful ocean."

That's more like it! I am a tiger: rar!

"A terrible aspect" - now where have I heard that before?

Anyway, later on King Harry says this:

"Our gayness and our gilt are all besmirch'd

With rainy marching in the painful field;

There's not a piece of feather in our host--

Good argument, I hope, we will not fly--

And time hath worn us into slovenry:

But, by the mass, our hearts are in the trim;

And my poor soldiers tell me, yet ere night

They'll be in fresher robes, or they will pluck

The gay new coats o'er the French soldiers' heads

And turn them out of service."

Monkey Challenge: What Is Wisdom?

While the last episode Who Am I? seemed good compared with the rather poor run that preceded it, What is Wisdom? is the first genuinely good episode in a while - certainly the first in the second season.

This is thanks to the memorable and well-realised competition between Tripitaka and an evil magician (the villain-of-the-week) to demonstrate which of their religions - Buddhism or Taoism - is better.

The contest between Buddhism and Taoism is one of the tales in the version of Monkey I have read and, although much of it has been changed considerably, the basic setup is the same - the evil Taoist has rigged the contest so he can defeat the human Tripitaka, but has reckoned without Monkey's magic tricks turning the tables.

The episode ends with another of the increasingly-common cloud-flying chase scenes, but one of the better of these, that sees Monkey extend machine guns from his cloud and dogfight with the magician.

The Space Adventures of Little Gay Longcat

Part 27: Something Following

Monkey Challenge: Who Am I?

A big improvement on the last couple, Who Am I? saves disc 10 from being the weakest of the Monkey DVDs so far.

Even the Monkeys With Badges were on the verge of criticising Monkey after The Foolish Philosopher, and for a monkey that's almost akin to treason against their Monkey King. They might even have had to hand in their badges.

The plot immediately goes off in a new and interesting direction after Monkey, Tripitaka, Pigsy and Sandy lose their memories after eating some magic mushrooms. The only one not affected is Yu Lung (because he didn't eat the mushrooms, not because he was immune), and this allows him to actually make a positive contribution to the story for a nice change.

Monkey falls in with some bandits who, after he beats them in a fight (even without his Magic Wishing Staff, which he has mislaid), mistake him for an evil prince and suggest he join them in their attempt to capture Tripitaka.

They capture Tripitaka while Pigsy and Sandy are off having their own crazy sub-plot about buying new memories from a magician, which leads to Pigsy getting the memories of a rooster and acting like one until he gets his own memory back.

Monkey mistakes Yu Lung for the fearsome Monkey, guardian of Tripitaka, that the bandits have warned him about. These scenes are amusing, with Monkey wanting to fight but Yu Lung doing his best to avoid it, until Yu Lung gives Monkey his memories back by accident.

Once Monkey has his memory back then it's all over bar the inevitable fight with the evil-spirits-of-the-week that were behind it all, since Monkey's magic is easily up to the job of restoring the others' memories.

It's a decent episode rather than an outstanding one, but a welcome return to form after the last few.

Big Gay Longcat reviews Star Trek: Catspaw

Today Starcat and I are going to review another Star Trek episode, and because it is a scary one we are going to have help from Scary Cat who isn't afraid of anything (except maybe Hoover, but don't tell him I said that or he will make a scary face at me).

The episode is called Catspaw, and I like it already just from the name.

It starts with the Enterprise going round a planet. Scotty and Lt Sulu are on the planet and Captain Kirk is worried about them. Jackson beams up all by himself, then falls down and goes

Actually he says there is a curse on the ship and if they don't go away they will all die. Jackson speaks in a scary voice (though not as scary as Balok's scary face) and then he is really dead.

Captain Kirk isn't scared. He beams down with Mr Spock and Dr McCoy. There they pick up life signs but the Enterprise can only detect the three of them on the planet. Then they lose contact with the Enterprise.

They meet the three witches from MacBeth who tell Captain Kirk to go back. Captain Kirk still isn't scared, just confused. He asks Mr Spock to comment.

"Very bad poetry, Captain."

"A more useful comment, Mr Spock?"

They find a spooky castle and go inside. Straightaway they meet a black cat! It mews and for the first time Captain Kirk is scared. He recovers quickly and tries not to look scared when when the door closes behind them and makes a loud noise.

The cat mews again and they fall through a hole in the floor and are knocked out. When they wake up they are in prison. Scotty and Lt Sulu come in but they have been hypno-eyesed.

They are about to take Captain Kirk, Mr Spock and Dr McCoy somewhere else when Captain Kirk and Mr Spock try to fight them. A manny shouts "stop!" and suddenly they are in a different room which is much more fabulous-looking than the prison.

There is a manny there and the cat is there too. Captain Kirk immediately demands answers from the manny, who is called Korob. The cat speaks to Korob and is obviously the one who is really in charge out of the two of them.

Korob has a magic wand. He uses it to make noms appear for them but they don't want to eat. He makes jewels appear instead but Captain Kirk is not impressed by this either. Korob says he has been testing their loyalty, bravery and integrity.

The cat leaves the room and another manny comes in instead. She is Sylvia.

Captain Kirk gets the phaser away from hypno-eyesed Scotty, but Sylvia makes a little Enterprise and holds it over a candle. Captain Kirk is allowed to contact the real Enterprise and hears it is getting hotter. Captain Kirk gives in. The aliens spare the Enterprise but put a forcefield around it so they can't beam anyone down to try a rescue.

Captain Kirk and Mr Spock are put back in prison while Dr McCoy is hypno-eyesed like Scotty and Lt Sulu.

Sylvia and Korob argue. They are on a mission and they disagree about how to do it. Sylvia likes being shaped like a manny and wants to stay like that, but Korob says "we have a duty to the Old Ones."

At this point Cthulhu joined us to watch the rest of this episode, but I don't know why.

When Sylvia is alone with Captain Kirk (or she thinks she is, actually Korob is watching them secretly) she tries to team up with him instead of Korob.

Captain Kirk pretends to go along with Sylvia and kiffs her. She likes it and gives away secrets until she reads Captain Kirk's mind and realises he is just pretending (obviously Captain Kirk would much rather have been kiffing someone else). Sylvia gets very angry and Captain Kirk is put back in prison.

Korob comes and releases Captain Kirk and Mr Spock. He thinks Sylvia has gone mad and so he is on their side now. This is a very sudden change and I think the real explanation is that he was hoping Captain Kirk would kiff him too.

There is a giant shadow of a cat in their way.

"Why a cat?" asks Captain Kirk.

"Racial memories," Mr Spock explains. "The cat is the most ruthless, most terrifying of animals, as far back as the sabre-tooth tiger." Mr Spock is clever; he knows these things.

The giant cat chases them and knocks a door down, squashing Korob. Captain Kirk takes his magic wand from him and then Captain Kirk and Mr Spock fight with the hypno-eyesed Dr McCoy, Scotty and Lt Sulu, and knock them out.

Sylvia comes in and teleports herself and Captain Kirk away from Mr Spock for an ultimate showdown. She wants Captain Kirk to hand over the magic wand, which is really a 'transmuter' that allows them to use their magic powers.

Captain Kirk breaks it instead, and there is a flash explosion. The castle disappears, and Dr McCoy, Scotty and Lt Sulu aren't hypno-eyesed anymore.

There are two tiny blue aliens with tentacle faces, the real Sylvia and Korob, and they die. Cthulhu's plans to nom the world have been foiled once again.

Scary face! That means it is the end of the episode.

This is a great episode of Star Trek because it has cats in it, and there are not nearly enough of those. Also it is really obvious that the cat is actually Sylvia in disguise, which means that Captain Kirk kiffed a cat!

Cthulhu was the only one of us who didn't like this story. I asked him why but he was being grumpy and only said something about the stars not being right...

Big Gay Longcat reviews Doctor Who: The Snows of Terror

Part four of The Keys of Marinus starts with Ian and Barbara still in the cold place they appeared in at the end of part three. There is snow and wind and haunting music like they're in the film Excalibur.

Ian and Barbara decide to have sleeps in the snow, which is quite surprising when they're supposed to be on an adventure, but then I quite often feel like having sleeps when I am supposed to be doing other things so maybe they were just sleepy.

A manny called Vasor finds them and takes them to his house where it is warm because he has a fire. When he wakes up Ian swaps his teleport bracelet with Vasor for some warm clothes and he goes to look for Altos, Susan and Sabetha.

Ian sees wolves like this one (I think he looks quite cuddly really) and then he finds Altos.

Barbara sees Vasor has a drawer with Sabetha's keys in it so she knows he is a baddy. He admits it. Ian also finds this out from Altos at the same time but in a different place, which is a clever piece of storytelling by Terry Nation.

Vasor attacks Barbara, but she lets Ian and Altos in the house and they capture Vasor and make him take them to where Susan and Sabetha are. Susan and Sabetha are in a cave. They are lost, but no wolves or polar bears come to get them.

They find a bridge and cross it (that's what a bridge is for, after all).

Vasor is scared and says there are demons in the cave. Ian, Barbara and Altos find the same bridge and cross it, finding Susan and Sabetha on the other side. But Vasor is still a baddy and he drops the bridge so everyone except for him is trapped.

Ian, Barbara, Altos, Susan and Sabetha find the key in a block of ice, surrounded by four statues of warriors. There is also a tap that turns the heat on and the ice begins to melt.

Ian and Altos improvise a new bridge. I don't know what it's made of.

Sabetha gets the key and then the statues come to life. It is a shocking moment when one of them opens its eyes.

They all run away. Ian fights the warriors while Susan crosses the new bridge. This is a very tense scene - bits fall off the new bridge, but eventually Susan gets across. She puts the old bridge back up so the others can cross, then Ian takes it down again so one of the warriors falls down into the hole.

The other warriors are confused. They can't talk but if they could I think they would say "where did our bridge go?"

Ian, Barbara, Altos, Susan and Sabetha get back to Vasor's hut to get their teleport bracelets back from him. They must have forgotten about them when they captured Vasor earlier, but that is understandable because they were worried about Susan and Sabetha.

Vasor threatens Susan but the warriors turn up (maybe they jumped across or maybe they improvised their own bridge, I don't know I'm just a cat) and kill him. Ian, Barbara, Altos, Susan and Sabetha teleport away so the warriors can't get them.

Ian appears in a room where there is a manny on the floor, I think he is having sleeps. Ian sees there is a key in the room. Another manny knocks Ian out and then steals the key. We don't find out who this mysterious manny is because that is the end of the episode.

This is a very fast-moving episode with lots happening, and it really builds up the tension towards the end, though a lot of that would not have been there if Ian, Barbara and Altos had remembered to take the teleport bracelets with them to the cave. Silly mannys.

The Space Adventures of Little Gay Longcat

Part 26: Crossroads